I would've never thunk

There was a story a few days ago in the news that Gilles Duceppe had (somewhat controversially) stated that a sovereign Quebec would indeed have its own army. I was mildly surprised by these statements, especially since Duceppe stated that Quebec might even need "to go to war" (even if he was referring to "humanitarian war", that's still somewhat surprising.)

I always thought the reason a number of western militaries still existed was because they were simply a relic of the past, an entity that national governments found too radical to terminate. And that, if Canada was founded today, instead of in 1867, partly in response to an American threat to Canadian sovereignty, we wouldn't even bother to establish a military.

Well, I guess I was wrong, at least in relation to Quebec.

And I'm happy to see that Gilles Duceppe recognizes that it is undignified for a nation to be without an armed forces, for the sake of protecting one's own sovereignty, and also for the sake of not being a pacifist in this world, turning a blind eye to certain injustices that could be stopped by the courageous work of the men and women who make up the military.